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Shahid Afridi, the Pakistan allrounder, has cut short his Sri Lanka Premier League campaign and returned to Karachi following a health issue with his wife. He was playing for Ruhuna Royals and was originally to stay with them until Saturday, before joining the Pakistan squad in Dubai for the limited-overs series against Australia.”Everything is fine now and I will be in the UAE on time (on August 26) to join the squad,” Afridi told ESPNcricinfo.”He had to rush back home to see his wife,” an SLPL organiser told ESPNcricinfo. “He was never meant to complete the tournament so anyway he has only missed one match.”Ruhuna, currently fifth in the SLPL table, are almost out of the reckoning for a place in the semi-finals. Afridi scored 54 in three innings and picked up two wickets.Afridi had initially been named the international icon player for the Nagenahira franchise but was withdrawn as the franchises wanted to make sure their icon players were available throughout the tournament.

ScorecardSteve Magoffin was in the wickets again as Durham crumbled in their second innings•Getty Images

Steve Magoffin broke the back of the Durham innings to give Sussex the chance of claiming an important Championship victory at Arundel.The Queenslander took 4 for 15 in an outstanding 10-over spell with the new ball before rain curtailed Durham’s second innings on 80 for 7 with an hour remaining on the third day. It means they lead by 80 after Sussex were dismissed for 231, to leave the scores level after the first innings, and their hopes largely depend on captain Paul Collingwood, who was 29 not out.Magoffin took his wicket tally for the season to 32, striking first when Mark Stoneman was leg-before in the fourth over offering no shot. In his next over Magoffin profited from the erratic bounce at one end to pin Gordon Muchall for a duck with a ball which kept low.While Muchall could consider himself unfortunate, Ben Stokes was dismissed in soft fashion, caught at midwicket looking to work Magoffin through the leg side. Will Smith and Dale Benkenstein staged a recovery of sorts to take the score to 29 before they fell in successive balls after tea.James Anyon, having been struck for four boundaries earlier in the over, hit back to have Smith caught behind as he pushed forward and Magoffin claimed his fourth victim with the next delivery when Benkenstein fell in identical fashion.Anyon gave way to Kirk Wernars who struck with his first ball as Phil Mustard mistimed a pull to midwicket and the seventh wicket fell in the 22nd over when Scott Borthwick was caught behind off Luke Wright playing defensively. Collingwood and Calum Thorp added 18 more runs before the heavens opened.It was certainly a day for the bowlers with 15 wickets falling, seven of them lbw. There was seam movement throughout and as a soft pitch dried out, so the bounce became more unpredictable. Sussex had been indebted to captain Mike Yardy and wicketkeeper Ben Brown who both made half-centuries before their last four wickets fell in 21 balls for the addition of ten runs.Yardy, dropped on 55, was eventually lbw to Collingwood having added 66 in 23 overs with Brown. Sussex were eyeing a sizeable first-innings lead on 221 for 6 but they collapsed horribly to the second new ball. Thorp picked up Wernars and Magoffin with successive deliveries while Brown was defeated by a shooter from Chris Rushworth after hitting seven fours in his 51.Sussex were still ten behind having lost three wickets in eight balls but Monty Panesar struck a couple of boundaries to level the scores before Rushworth had him caught at mid-on to end the innings.

New Zealand captain Kane Williamson has said the ‘underdogs’ tag should inspire his young side to raise their game against a strong West Indies unit. Williamson was speaking after his first ODI as New Zealand captain, in which his team slipped to a nine-wicket loss to West Indies in Kingston.”It is disappointing, but we know we are underdogs and hopefully that breeds a fearless attitude in our camp,” Williamson said. “We have to move forward as that is the only thing that we can do in a five-match series.”Williamson said that though he enjoyed the responsibility of leading the team, it was difficult to put the disappointment of the loss aside. The loss in the first ODI was New Zealand’s third on this tour, after losing the Twenty20 series 2-0.”That [winning] has an influence, as a captain it is extremely important and we are yet to have [a win] in the series.”There are a lot of challenges for us in the series, not only the quality of the opposition and the conditions, but more so [after] the injuries we have had to get a consistent side on the park and to have consistent planning to move forward.”In a one-sided match, wicketkeeper BJ Watling’s 60 was the lone positive for New Zealand. Watling, who earned praise from his captain, said it was the batsmen who lost New Zealand the game.”We fell a good 50-60 runs short on that wicket,” Watling said. “My gameplan was to try and stay there for a little while and try to set a little bit of a platform so we could at least bat through to 45-50 overs. I was a bit disappointed not to get 20 more runs and boost the strike-rate up around 80.” Watling finished with a strike-rate of just over 60.The loss, he said, took a mental toll on the team. “Today’s loss isn’t ideal for the confidence. We’re not high in confidence at all and they are, so that’s probably hurting us. We need to find it in the next game or two, otherwise the series will be gone before we even know it.”To turn things around, it is important that the bowlers also come up with a new gameplan, Watling said. “We need to figure out how to take some wickets over here. The wickets are reasonably flat for the quicks – there’s not a lot of swing or seam – so we need to find some ways of restricting and building up some pressure.”

ScorecardTony Roland-Jones took four wickets to help restrict Hampshire•Getty Images

Ireland batsman Paul Stirling’s belligerent 71 guided Middlesex to a six-wicket Friends Life t20 win over Hampshire at West End.Stirling clubbed eight fours and two sixes in his 49-ball innings and was ably supported by Dawid Malan’s 46 as Middlesex bounced back from their opening two defeats in the competition and ended Hampshire’s impressive home run of eleven successive wins – dating back to July 2010 – in the process.Hampshire, put in by Middlesex captain Neil Dexter, made 157 for 6 from their 20 overs, with James Vince putting behind him a disappointing season thus far to top-score with 64 not out. At one stage Hampshire were 83 for 5 but Vince and skipper Dimitri Mascarenhas began a recovery with a stand of 44 for the sixth wicket.Toby Roland-Jones conceded only nine from his first two overs while taking three wickets and finished with impressive figures of 4 for 25. The fast bowler dismissed openers Jimmy Adams and Michael Carberry while Neil McKenzie, making his first appearance of the season, was caught by Ollie Rayner at short fine-leg off his second delivery.Roland-Jones returned later to bowl Mascarenhas but Vince moved to his half-century off 42 balls and at the close of the innings had hit five fours and a six from 47 deliveries.Middlesex made a poor start to their response with Kabir Ali bowling Joe Denly and Mascarenhas having danger man Chris Rogers snapped up by Sean Ervine with only 18 on the board.But then came the match-winning partnership between powerfully-built Stirling and Malan for the third wicket. Stirling and Malan put on 107 in 13 overs and there was no way back after that for Hampshire.Malan went for 46 in the 16th over but big-hitting Stirling took Middlesex within sight of victory before lofting Ervine to Carberry at midwicket. Middlesex coasted to victory, requiring ten from the final two overs and a single from Kabir Ali’s last over of the match, with Berg duly hitting the second ball for four to ensure an unexpected win.

Suspended CSA chief executive Gerald Majola will know his fate by May 31. That is the timeframe the country’s sports minister, Fikile Mbalula, and CSA have agreed on for completion of Majola’s disciplinary hearing.The hearing concerns R4.7 million ($671,428) paid in unauthorised bonuses to CSA staff after the hosting of the IPL and Champions Trophy in 2009. Senior council John Myburgh will chair the disciplinary committee and an independent prosecutor will be appointed from the Bar Council for the proceedings.Majola was suspended in March after an independent commission of inquiry, convened on the order of Mbalula and chaired by Judge Chris Nicholson, recommended that Majola undergo a formal disciplinary process. CSA had not previously taken any such action against their chief executive despite internal and external investigations, which found that bonuses were paid without due procedure being followed.Majola was cautioned against violating corporate governance by the internal investigation, chaired by former president AK Khan, and severely reprimanded after an audit by KPMG and subsequent legal advice found that he had breached the Companies Act. The bonuses, which were awarded to 40 CSA staff members, were paid in addition to a payment that had already been made for extra work done during both those events and were not declared to the board.Importantly, Mbalula said all money that was awarded improperly will have to be paid back. “If there is anyone that received bonuses outside the ambit of the law and that was not properly declared, those people will be attended to,” Mbalula said, adding that it would include those who have since resigned from CSA. “Civil processes will be lodged for those who are outside CSA,” he said. “At the end of the day, the bonuses will have to be recovered.”CSA survived the meeting with the minister with its board intact, despite speculation in the local media that Mbalula would ask them to resign en masse. Mbalula revealed that he did not make any such request because the ministry was impressed with the steps the board had taken since the Nicholson report was made public. They suspended Majola and appointed an acting CEO, Jacques Faul. They also had a change of guard in the presidency post as Khan resigned and Willie Basson was appointed acting president.”We didn’t ask the board to resign because we made our own examination of things,” Mbalula said. “They have got an acting CEO and acting chairperson. To ask for the entirety of the board to resign, certain things would not have been done in terms of the Nicholson recommendations. If the board feels they have been part of the mess, they can’t avoid the mess. They must be part of the broomstick that cleans the mess.”The other recommendations Mbalula referred to was the restructuring of CSA’s board, proposed by Nicholson, which called for a smaller board with more independent directors. An eight-person steering committee was appointed in March, consisting of four board members and four outsiders, all of whom have been involved in cricket in some capacity, to discuss the restructure. That committee will now be added to, as members of the ministry and the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee will also be party to their meetings.The steering committee will go on a roadshow of the 11 provincial associations with their proposal, before presenting it to the national indaba on governance restructuring ahead of September’s AGM. A new board will be elected in September and Mbalula said it will remain up to CSA whether any of the current board members can stand again.CSA will also launch a transformation fund in May, which will serve the aim of developing the game in previously disadvantaged areas and communities. Basson is passionate about ensuring cricket reaches the majority of the South African population from grassroots level and was previously the transformation chairperson. “CSA has committed itself to the philosophy that transformation has to be advanced on the basis of a natural evolutionary process that will enable us to grow as a sport over the next 20 years,” Mbalula said.

The Professional Cricketers’ Association and ECB will continue to insist that all players, including short term overseas signings, undergo anti-corrupotion education – even though the three-month amnesty to report match-fixing has produced nothing of major significance.Players arriving on short-term deals for the Friends Life t20 represent a major remaining obstacle in the education programme set up by the PCA and ECB in the wake of the Mervyn Westfield trial. Westfield pleaded guilty in January to spot-fixing while playing for Essex. He was sentenced to four months in prison but released on licence last week after serving half the sentence.Every professional cricketer in the country has been required to work through an online tutorial. Overseas players have been given a two-week period after arriving in the country to complete it but the PCA has encouraged counties to arrange for players to fulfil the obligation before they arrive.The Westfield trial prompted the ECB to open an amnesty window for confidentially reporting information about corruption. The window closed on April 30 with the ECB and PCA satisfied with the progress made in tackling corruption.Current and former players came forward with information but nothing of major significance has been discovered. “All of this information has been managed in confidence and has given us a clear picture of the nature of the threat our game faces from corrupt activities,” Chris Watts, the ECB’s anti-corruption officer, said. “The absence of a significant number of new reports is reassuring but the access unit will rigorously review any report of alleged corruption.”Angus Porter, chief executive of the PCA, said the amnesty window “had not uncovered a can of worms” but said it has served a greater purpose. “More importantly we’ve taken the opportunity to remind people of their duty to report incidents without delay. It’s been helpful as part as a general process of education.”Essex, Westfield’s former county, were criticised for their reaction to the incident which occurred in September 2009 but was not reported until early 2010. They were accused in the trial at the Old Bailey for “turning a blind eye” to corruption by defence counsel Mark Milliken-Smith QC, a criticism they later dismissed as unjustified.”We’ve been working closely with the Essex lads,” Porter said. “We’ve all come an awfully long way since 2010. The emphasis of our discussions with them has been to acknowledge that they did the right thing in coming forward as they did.”The PCA remains undecided on whether to use Westfield as part of its future education programme. He and former team-mate, the Pakistan international Danish Kaneria, who was named during the trial as the man who groomed Westfield for corruption, are the subject of an ECB disciplinary hearing on May 21.The hearing has been delayed to allow Kaneria’s lawyers more time to prepare their defence. Kaneria has not yet confirmed whether he will attend the hearing in person.